Tractates on the Books of Holy Scripture (Tractatus Origenis) 2.1–2.4

"And the Lord appeared to Abraham at the oak of Mamre, beside the crossroads." I must labor and search, dearest brothers, to find what it means that this noble patriarch and admirable prophet prophesied by word or by deed, because he showed many things that were to come, not only by word but by act. As we now read his deeds and compare the figurative events with the Gospel, let us take from them full and perfect comfort for our hope. Abraham, then, bearing in himself a fourfold figure, held out through an image a great mystery of the divine dispensation. For one figure in him was of the law and the prophets; another of the people of Israel, to whom the law was to be handed down; a third of the Savior and of us, who were to be sons of the faith of this same Abraham through Christ; a fourth of the people that does not believe. Therefore we must observe with great care and diligence where and when and how and to what matter he had applied the time: that is, when it concerns the Savior and us, when the law and the prophets, when the believing people, when the unbelieving Jews. For see, it is said: "God appeared to Abraham at the oak of Mamre beside the crossroads" (that is, at a meeting of four roads) "as he sat at the door of his tent at noon. And looking up with his eyes he saw, and behold, three men were standing before him. And when he saw them, he ran to meet them. And he bowed down to the ground and said: 'Lord, if I have found favor before you, do not pass by your servant; I will take water, and let your feet be washed, and refresh yourselves under the tree.'" Since, then, Abraham is said to have had his tent at the crossroads, at the oak of Mamre, where all who passed by found refuge, it was a figure that from everywhere and from all parts of the world, from the ends of the earth, people would run together to faith in God through the apostles, who were to be sons of Abraham. Indeed our Lord and Savior himself fulfilled the figure given beforehand when he says in the Gospel: "The wedding is ready, but those invited were not worthy; go now to the crossroads and call whomever you find to the wedding feast." In saying this he showed that, when the Jews, who had been called through the law and the prophets to the union of Christ and the Church, had judged themselves unworthy by not coming, that is, by not believing in him, then the apostles were sent to the crossroads to gather the peoples of believers from all nations and to be a refuge for the nations, by whom that wedding banquet of Christ and the Church, as I said, would be filled. So also the blessed apostle said to the unbelieving Jews: "It was necessary that the word of God be preached to you first; but since you have rejected it and judged yourselves unworthy, we are turning to the Gentiles." And so, when Abraham is said to live beside the crossroads, it signified that the calling of the Gentiles was to come, since it had been promised to him that "in your seed all nations shall be blessed," and that he would be the father of many nations. That tree, moreover, clearly bore the image of the cross, which to some might seem hard and rough, being wooden, because the Lord was hung there so that our sins, which had come upon us from the tree of transgression, might in turn be nailed to the wood of the cross and punished through the same man, as the blessed apostle says when discussing the mystery of the cross: "Nailed to it," he says, "he expiated the offense." To others, however, it provided shade and coolness, because believers are protected and refreshed from the heat and burning of persecution, as it is written: "In the shadow of your wings I will hope until iniquity passes." For the cross of Christ, as the apostle says, is folly to those who are perishing, but to those who are to be saved it is the power of God. That tent, the hut where Abraham stayed for a time, was a figure of the city of Jerusalem, in which for a time the law and the prophets, and the Lord himself and the apostles, dwelt, and which was afterwards to be left like a hut in a vineyard, according to Isaiah's saying. When is a hut in a vineyard left, if not when the vintage is finished? So too, when the vintage

of the Lord's passion was finished, Zion was left like a hut in a vineyard. But what is this, that Abraham says three men came to him, and he worshiped one of them, recognized one as his God, and confessed himself the servant and slave of one, saying: "Lord, if I have found favor before you, do not pass by your servant"? If, then, there is one Lord who deigned to come to visit Abraham, let us observe more carefully who those two companions of his are. These two, men or angels, who accompanied the Lord are, if my attention does not mislead or deceive me, Moses and Elijah: the one the giver of the ancient law, who through that law preached the coming of the Lord; the other he who is to come at the close of the world to preach the gospel of Christ to the Jews and make them noble Christians, the forerunner, that is, of the Lord's second coming. Indeed, when the Lord was transfigured on the mountain, as he will come in his kingdom, these two, Moses and Elijah, were seen by the apostles with the Lord. How they were recognized by the apostles we must not pass over in silence. Now, dearest brothers, I say what I think: Moses came to Christ with those tablets of the covenant that he had received from the Lord on Mount Sinai, and Elijah with the same chariot in which he had been taken up, and so the apostles recognized who they were; and on their account the blessed apostle Peter says: "Lord, it is good for us to be here; if you wish, let us make three tents, one for you, one for Moses, one for Elijah." As, then, these two men, Moses and Elijah, were seen by the apostles with the Lord on the high mountain, so also they appeared then with the same Lord, because with God all things are complete that seem incomplete to us, as the apostle says: "Who calls the things that are not as though they were." For it was necessary that what was to come should first be shown to the founder of our faith, as suited the place and time, and so afterwards be revealed in truth to us, who are his sons. Indeed the Lord himself bore witness to this in the Gospel, saying: "Abraham sought to see my day, and he saw it and was glad." He saw the day of the Lord's coming then, certainly, and came to know the mysteries of his plan, when, glad with joy, he ran to meet him as he came, when he prepared a banquet and in the spirit of prophecy joyfully set out what suited the mystery of the banquet, and when he washed his feet to show full and perfect service at his coming. Indeed the Lord himself entrusted this same service to the seed of Abraham, so that he himself washed the feet of the sons of his faith, the apostles, in order to make beautiful, by the cleansing of his washing, the feet of those who bring the good news of peace.

But since the same Abraham bore in himself a twofold figure of the people that was to come from him, both of those of his seed who would believe in Christ and of those who would not believe, as it is written, "So shall your seed be, like the stars of heaven and like the sand of the sea" (which he said not only because of their number, but to show significantly a people divided in two from his seed: those who believed in Christ would shine like the stars of heaven, while those who refused to believe would be cast down like the sand of the sea and trodden into the ground), therefore this tent of Abraham, bearing the figure of the city of Jerusalem, clearly bore the likeness of the calling of both peoples, both of those from Israel who would believe in Christ and of those who believed from the crossroads, that is, from the nations of various peoples. But now let us see what the mystery of that banquet which Abraham offered the Lord indicates. "A calf," it says, "tender and fattened, butter and milk, and loaves baked in ashes," that is, unleavened, "mixed from three measures of fine flour." The time for speaking does not allow us to follow all these out clearly, and so, with the Lord's favor, I will touch on each briefly and concisely. This tender, fattened calf, then, prefigured the flesh of the Lord, which was to be sacrificed by the unbelieving sons of Abraham's flesh for the salvation of those who believe, as the apostle too says: "Christ our Passover has been sacrificed." He calls it fattened because it was rich with the fullness of all good works, as the apostle says: "In whom all the fullness of the divinity dwells bodily." This calf of the Lord's body, then, which in the Gospel is slain for the sinful son, was itself sacrificed for us by the unbelievers, and from it the finest banquet is prepared for believers. That he speaks of butter and milk set out together with the flesh of the calf: we have learned on the authority of the apostle that this is the ancient law given through Moses. For so he writes to the Galatians: "I gave you milk to drink, not food, for you were not yet able, nor are you able even now." For he had handed down to them the commandments of the law as milk pressed from the breasts of the two tablets of the law, which is the testament of faith; for because of the infancy of their understanding they could not yet take the solid and strong food of the gospel teaching. The butter is the preaching of John the Baptist, which is joined to the Gospel; he was in the spirit and power of Elijah the forerunner of the Lord's first coming, as Elijah himself will come before the second. That John the Baptist is himself Elijah, not by the matter of the flesh but by one and the same power of the spirit, the Lord proves in the Gospel when he says of this John: "If you wish to know, he is Elijah who is to come." Why John's preaching is compared to butter I will say briefly. Butter, though it is of the nature of milk, is already a richer and more solid substance. So too John's preaching, though it still used the milk of the ancient law, because the law and the prophets were until John, yet already announced a much stricter and severer rule of discipline, saying: "Already the axe is laid to the root, and every tree that does not bear good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire. Brood of vipers, who showed you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear therefore fruits worthy of repentance," and so on. In short, he urged them with frequent rebukes to repent, to wash away their sins in baptism, to prepare the ways of the Lord and make his paths straight, that is, to prepare their hearts and minds by good deeds to receive the coming of Christ. For just as butter is drawn together and made solid by frequent churning or constant shaking, so those who had received the milk of the law through Moses, stirred by John's many rebukes and the frequent beating of his voice, advanced to a more solid substance of faith, just as David, doing penance, said that his heart was curdled like milk. Further, when butter is made, the whey is separated from the milk, and oil is made from butter. So too the unbelievers are separated from the milk of the law like whey, and from John's preaching, which is the richest butter, the testimony of the Gospels is supplied like oil. And so, when Abraham set before the Lord to eat the calf with milk and butter, it signified that neither can the body of the Lord, which is the calf, be without the milk of the law, nor the milk of the law without the butter, which is John's preaching, nor John's preaching without the fullness of the Gospel.

What the three measures of fine flour signify, and what the unleavened loaves baked in ashes from the three measures, we must not pass over in silence. The three measures, then, are the three generations of Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth, from whom after the flood the whole human race was restored, that is, from whom all tribes, tongues, and nations began to be; from them those who believe in Christ were to be companions of his passion and partakers of the holy table, and indeed to be counted into the bread of the Lord's body. They are compared to fine flour for this reason: first, like strong and sturdy grains, they were separated from the chaff of the Gentiles by the breath of the Holy Spirit and taken into the mill of the law, so that whatever hardness was in them might be broken. Then the bran of sins was shaken out, so that the pure and white vows of faith of the believing peoples might be cleansed like fine flour, as it is written: "The Nazirites were made whiter than snow." For sprinkled with the water of baptism, they were made one body of love. But why does he say unleavened loaves baked in ashes? Unleavened, certainly, because the unity of believers had to be without the leaven of malice, without the ferment of perverse teaching, without the swelling and pride of a mad heart; and baked in ashes, because it was necessary that every believer be counted into the bread of Christ's body through repentance and lawful satisfaction and confession of past offenses, just as John the Baptist said to those who were to be baptized: "Bear fruits worthy of repentance." And the blessed apostle Peter said to the believing Jews: "Repent and be baptized in the name of our Lord for the forgiveness of sins." And so loaves baked in ashes are set out, because through the satisfaction of repentance the souls of believers are taken up by the Lord. You see, then, dearest brothers, that the mystery of this reading has drawn the outline of the order of our salvation. Abraham, who received the Lord, was a figure of the saints who received the coming of Christ with joy. His tent, I said, was a type of Jerusalem, where the Lord first came, who was welcomed by believers but hung by unbelievers on the wood of the cross and slain like a fattened calf. The milk and butter signify what the law and the prophets prophesied until John. The three measures of fine flour from which Sarah made the loaves baked in ashes, I said, indicated the image of the three sons from whom the whole human race was born, who, believing in the divine Trinity, that is, in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, were to be sprinkled with the water of baptism through the Church, of which Sarah was the image, and to be brought together into the one bread of Christ's body. For Sarah, as I have said, bore the type of the Church, which was the obedient minister of the sacraments. The loaves are unleavened, that is, without leaven, as was said, because we must be without the leaven of malice, without the ferment of wickedness and perverse teaching; and baked in ashes, because, converted through repentance to the sacrament of baptism and baked by the heat of the Holy Spirit, we were to become acceptable to God as food well pleasing to him. And Sarah's son, promised and given in old age, indicated that in the last old age of the world the Church would conceive by the word of God and have a free-born people of Christians, who would be heir of the promised inheritance, that is, of the heavenly kingdom.